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Biographical Directory of Documentation and Information Science

About this project

This Biographical Directory of Documentation and Information Science is an international effort to document the lives and contributions of people and organizations who have made substantial contributions to the field.

This resource is designed to enable historical work in the field by identifying pioneering individuals and organizations significant to the development of Information Science, and providing locations of personal papers and archival records related to these individuals and organizations.

List of all pages.

It also includes a list of all pages, and a list of known oral histories of information scientists.

This directory is a publication of the Special Interest Group on the History and Foundations of Information Science of the Association for Information Science and Technology. The Editor is appointed by and reports to the Chair of the SIG. An Advisory Committee appointed by the Editor makes recommendations to the Editor and to the SIG Chair.

History

"Pioneers of Information Science" was initiated by Dr. Robert V. Williams, Distinguished Professor, Emeritus, School of Library and Information Science, University of South Carolina in 1996. The objectives of that project were to locate and document the archives and personal papers of individuals and organizations from the U.S. and Canada that were significant to the development of Information Science and Technology in the 20th century.

→ Read more about the original project

The initial Editor of the revived project was Jenny Bossaller (2024 - 2025), then Michael Buckland (2025 - present).

From today’s featured article

Patrick Wilson (1927–2003) was an American theorist of bibliographic control.

Patrick G. Wilson

Patrick Garland Wilson was born on December 29, 1927 and grew up in Santa Cruz, California. He studied philosophy at the University of California, Berkeley: AB with highest honors, in 1949 and PhD,with a dissertation on On interpretation and understanding in 1960. He also completed a Bachelor of Library Science degree in 1953 and worked in the University Library 1950-1959, latterly as a bibliographer in South Asia studies. From 1960 Wilson taught philosophy at the University of California, Los Angeles, then returned to Berkeley in 1965 as professor and, later, dean of the School of Librarianship (later School of Information). He retired in 1991 and died on September 12, 2003.

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Contributions and Editorial Policies

We invite contributions from all members of the information science community. We especially seek international contributions. If you would like to write an entry, please read about the scope of the project and create a short article (a stub) that includes the individual or organization that you wish to nominate and submit it to the editors at biographicaleditor at gmail dot com.

See also our Manual of Style [1] and Article Template page.

→ Read the full editorial policies